


He Lived Here

by riddlesinthedark (MrsSaxon)



Category: Gotham (TV)
Genre: And finds evidence of this, In light of 3x17, M/M, Oneshot, Oswald comes home, STILL upset they didn't meet, So I guess we'll just have to have this, To the home that Ed has been living in, past drug usage
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-11
Updated: 2017-05-11
Packaged: 2018-10-30 14:49:37
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 885
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10879053
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MrsSaxon/pseuds/riddlesinthedark
Summary: Oswald comes home within hours of Ed vacating it. The house tells the story of what's been happening while Oswald was gone.





	He Lived Here

“Has someone been living here?” Ivy mused, peering around the mansion.

Oswald turned on her, discombobulating the short caravan of arrivals. “What makes you say that?”

The girl shrugged. “No pile of mail on the floor and it smells aerated. You’ve been gone a couple weeks now, the air should have started to smell stale.”

An idea crept into the back of Oswald’s mind and curled up there. “I’m sure there’s just a window open,” he muttered, dismissing her. But the thought in the back of his mind wouldn’t be dismissed so easily.

As he toured the main floor of the house, the thought grew stronger, beginning to take an inky shape. Had he left the remotes like that? Well, he couldn’t be expected to remember now could he. One of the place settings at the table had less dust than the others, but that could just be an accident. There was edible food in the refrigerator, food that _wasn’t_ two weeks old. Not to mention the portrait. And that certainly wasn’t the way he left it.

These were just little details, but they were starting to build up. The black thought in the back of his head crept closer into his conscious thoughts, casting a long shadow over them. Oswald swallowed. It was probably just Olga or some of the staff. Certainly no one had been… living here. No one was here now. Of course not.

“Oooh, what’s upstairs?” Ivy had completed her circuit of the floor in time to find him hesitating at the foot of the stairs. “I call first dibs on bedrooms!” she cried, racing on ahead of him. 

“No, you don’t, the master bedroom is mine,” he chided her wearily, starting up the stairs after her. 

“Well, dibs after yours then,” Ivy groaned, already disappeared into one of the rooms, then, “Uh, Penguin? You should come see this.”

Oswald’s heart clenched despite himself. Don’t be silly, _no one_ was living here. there was absolutely no way-

He found Ivy standing in the doorway of what used to be Ed’s room. The sheets were made, although not the way Olga folded them. And there was a can of green paint at the foot of the bed. But these were secondary to what the paint had been used for. On the wall opposite the bed, someone had written “I Shot Oswald.”

“…wow,” Ivy murmured, “he _does not_ like you.”

Oswald’s fist tightened. “Don’t you have any more exploring to do, Ivy?!” he snapped.

He could hear Ivy draw breath for a retort but, mercifully, a crash came from downstairs.

“Ugh… I better go make sure Freeze and Firefly don’t kill each other. Don’t discover anything else without me!” she commanded before flying out of the room to settle what, in her mind, must have been a sibling squabble. 

Oswald collapsed against the door frame and heaved a breath after she’d left. He couldn’t be living here, he wouldn’t… would he? Oswald pulled his head up and permitted himself one more painful look at the room. He considered going to the bed, to see if anyone had recently lain in it… no. No, the words were proof of nothing except that someone _had_ been here and done this. It didn’t mean anyone was living here. No.

The dark thought in the back of his mind was almost upon him now. He could almost feel it breathing, each breath filling him with trepidation of what he would find in the rest of the mansion. Nonetheless, Oswald wrenched himself towards it. He would find out what had happened here in his absence.

As he walked down the hall, he saw few comforting sights. A fair few of the bathroom mirrors were smashed. The trash cans were stuffed full of kleenex. It seemed, nothing good had happened. 

At last, Oswald came to his own door. The thought in the back of his mind was now no longer in the back, no longer inconsequential. It was front and center, breathing, defined, substantial. It… was possible he was living here, had _been_ living here. The thought constricted around Oswald’s throat for reasons he could not explain. But, God, he’d give anything to find his old room with no trace of any interference, as if no one had ever slept there. It was not for himself he wanted this. Oswald opened the door.

There was… a dip in the mattress, in the covers, where someone had lain. His closet was ajar, someone had… been through his clothes. His eyes filled. No… no, this wasn’t what he wanted to find. Something glinted in the corner of his vision. Oswald frowned, blinking in case it was just a trick of the light. No, it was still there. He walked over to it. 

It was lying there, at the top of the trash can, over a misshapen pile of tissues. Oswald picked it up. It was some sort of tin, beautifully inlaid, completely foreign to him. He opened it. A half dozen white capsules rolled around inside. Oswald’s mouth ran dry. The paint, the mirror… the pills. Oh God, what did he do? 

His thoughts now were nothing, but the sick, black horror that he had lived here, stayed here, all this time. Oswald stared at the tin in his hand. “Ed.”


End file.
